Not that I doubt the legitimacy of the sensation for a moment. I don’t.

In fact, those are pretty accurate descriptions of what it feels like to take the first step in doing the thing.

Like you’re walking off into nothing. Plunging into a black hole. Taking first one step off and then … it all works.

The problem with this metaphor (and its associated variations) is that it’s freaking terrifying.

Which is just … oh, I don’t know, not helpful? It’s really, really not helpful. Or necessary,

Because there is no cliff.

I’m not saying it doesn’t feel like a cliff or look like a cliff or smell like a cliff.

And I’m definitely not saying that you shouldn’t be scared (I would never say that).

Just that the most important thing about these kinds of internal cliffs is remembering that they are not cliffs … and then rebuilding the metaphor. Transforming it into something that isn’t so impossibly scary.

Because honestly, there is no reason that I can think of to have to work through that much fear. It just doesn’t make sense — and it’s totally unfair.

We have more than enough fear to process in our lives already without turning each transition into the kind of experience that throws our nervous systems into panic and terror.

So if it’s not a cliff, what is it?

I don’t know.

But there’s a lot of power when it stops being a cliff.

I want to throw out a couple concepts and examples, and maybe I’ll figure out where we’re going with this.

Implied safety is not the same thing as feeling safe.

You know that thing at the Grand Canyon where you can walk out over a glass floor and stand over the canyon?

You’re not getting me to step out on that thing.

You can explain a thousand times how it’s completely safe. You can demonstrate in every possible way how physics is on your side and physics (like the house) always wins.

You can deliver social proof all over the place. You can show me people walking out and doing it. You can prove it in every way possible.

It’s still not going to happen. I’m not going to do it.

Not because I think I’m going to fall to my death. But because I’m not going to put my nerves through that kind of fear. The kind of fear that — to me, maybe not to you — is traumatizing, and takes years to heal from.

Not going to do it.

Point 1: There are enough legitimately fearful things in life. Not everyone needs to learn to face every single scary thing that exists.*

* Great example of this “facing fear” thing totally backfiring: my friend’s ex-girlfriend who jumped out of a plane to do just that. Oy.

From the jump to the path.

When I moved back to Israel, it scared me to pieces.

I was telling a friend and he said, “It’s like throwing yourself into a black hole, right?”

Exactly. That was exactly what it was like.

“Here’s the thing nobody tells you,” he said. “There is no black hole. You go from living your life here to living your life there. It’s just you and your life, with slight variations. No holes.”

He was right. I’ve moved countries twice since then and there was no black hole.

What there is instead is this big Continuum of You (ooh, fake band name!), and wherever you are on it is a part of you. You can contain different cultural and emotional identities at the same time.

That’s because you’re not constantly hurling yourself into space or off of cliffs.

You’re just going for a walk, and around this next bend is a new piece of terrain. But it’s not really all that different from what you already know.

Point 2: Not that the thing you can’t see yet isn’t scary by virtue of being unknown … it just doesn’t make it a cliff.

It’s about new structures.

I’m about to do a couple of scary new things right about now.

When I tell myself that I’m not ready to take the leap, it gets scarier.

So that’s not what I tell myself. What I tell myself is this:

“Even though this new house isn’t completely built yet, it does have a good foundation. I’m going to call on everyone who is capable of helping me, and we’re going to figure out what kind of windows I want it to have.”

I’m still on the ground. Not going anywhere near a cliff. Just building a new thing. Not alone. With help.

It’s still unknown because I can’t fully imagine what it will be like when we’re done, but at least it doesn’t require me jumping off into the fog.

Point 3: Your metaphor doesn’t have to be a building. It doesn’t have to be a path. Just try, if you can, to find something less terrifying than the cliff.

Because it pretty much always turns out that there is no cliff.

No cliffs.

Not that I want to negate your experience of the existence of your cliffs, because I don’t.

My point is really only that things get easier when I give myself these three things:

1. permission to be scared.
2. permission to not want to do it.
3. enough distance to be able to remember that the metaphor is mine
   and I get to play with it.

Because not jumping off cliffs is so completely on my dammit list. I don’t jump off cliffs, dammit.

Because I don’t have to.

Comment zen for today.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We’re practicing.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• The thing that stops you from doing the thing.
• The truth about procrastination
• My stuck isn’t talking, and things get weird. Also there is a trapeze.

So last week I wrote an “awkward love letter to a place that might or might not have a labyrinth”.

This week it’s a different kind of love letter. Not the awkward kind. Not one to something I’m trying to find. One to something I already have.

Background: I’ve been getting ready to welcome in the second year of my crazy-wonderful Kitchen Table program in January.

Which means that I’ve been doing huge amounts of reflecting on this past year (and — surprise! — will probably be sharing some of this reflecting with you in future posts), and what those experiences have given me.

But right now I’m just feeling overwhelmed by love. Love for what is right now, and the way it is right now.

So before I make an ask for the Right People for next year (probably next week), I want this week’s Very Personal Ad to be a place to be in appreciation.

Dear kooky, beautiful Kitchen Table,

I don’t always tell you this, because I am not a gushy, lovey-schmoo kind of person, but … man, I am so outrageously full of love for you.

What I love about you:

Your name.

From a strictly “business” perspective, I admit that it might not be the best metaphor in the world. Since the thing you have become is so much more than “at the kitchen table with Havi and Selma“.

So much more than late-night brainstorming and support and cameraderie.

But I love the hominess of it. The look of it. The comfort and hanging-out-ness of it all.

The people.

Someone said that I “curate” awesome people. And I don’t know what that magic something is that lets me find the exact right combination of people, but I genuinely like all of you.

And I especially like the mix.

Man, you are all sooooooo refreshingly different from each other.

Sure, each of you thinks that he’s the outsider or that she’s the weird one (or the non-hippie one), but really, every single person brings something cool and unique. And the combination of all those qualities meeting is just perfect.

Hanging out in the chatroom during calls. Goofing off. You guys are honestly some of the silliest people I know.

And some of the smartest. You probably just think that everyone else is the smart ones, but believe me, I like the way your mind works.

I love what I have learned from you.

I have learned to be really, really honest. I have learned about apologies. I have learned how to stop shepherding and start being a very different kind of leader. I have learned about clearing out my own stuff.

And I’ve watched you guys become different people. Or more yourselves. I don’t know.

I’ve watched you go from not feeling sure of what you want or how to ask for it … to being the kind of person who can communicate really clearly about what they need and how they want to receive it.

I have learned how crazy powerful it is when you have a bunch of people who have learned how to ask for what they need.

I have met my own hard.

This year has had its hard moments. I’ve doubted myself. I’ve had to untangle my own stucknesses.

It’s been one hell of a training in what it really means to be a leader. You guys have been with me for that process too. And I appreciate it so much.

The classes.

I love coming up with the classes. Love teaching. Love the fact that at some point each class devolves into hilarity. And I especially love the Ask Havi Anything days. Ooh, and I love it when someone else teaches and then I get to run wild in the chat room.

CrankyPants McGrumbleBug’s Kvetchtastic Whine Bar.

This might be my favorite part. And yes, I am a total genius for coming up with it!

Because it is so wonderful to have a forum (literally!) to complain about stuff without anyone trying to fix it. And then — once the stuck has been listened to — I always know when I’m ready for advice, and there’s a forum for that too.

It’s just such an amazing experience to show up with a stuck (and I’ve shown up with mine a thousand times) and have everyone be so completely understanding and comforting. And funny.

Also I appreciate the extremely creative and entertaining cursing that sometimes goes on in the whine bar. But also the kittens.

The changes.

When I look at people who back in January were stuckified about everything and terrified of the thing they wanted to be doing (or beating themselves up for not knowing what that is yet) …

And I see where you are now: strong, capable, confident, knowledgeable about yourself and your stuff, able to ask for help when you get stuckified, no longer thinking that receiving help and support says something bad about you …

It must makes me want to cry. You guys are serious helper mice. So gifted. And even if you can’t see it or hear it yet (or you just get occasional flashes of it), I know it.

I can feel the truth of it.

And it’s so beautiful it makes me cry. To prevent impending gooey-ness (or more gooey than I’m already getting into), on to my commitment.

My commitment for the remainder of this year and for this coming-right-up year:

I will keep loving you.

I will continue to read every single thread, even when there are a gazillion of them, as there so often are.

I will keep maintaining this space, clearing it and caring for it.

I will rewrite parts of the welcome orientation manual thing, to make them more clear and to help you guys figure out how to get the most love and support possible.

I’ll do everything I can to make sure that the group leaders are getting what they need.

I will try to remember to trust myself and this weird, wonderful process that is all of us working on our stuff together and individually.

The other thing I want to say.

This one is an ask.

And it’s about maintaining my energy this week while I’m on retreat.

Here’s what I want:

To not get overwhelmed or cut off from myself. To stay centered and grounded, whatever that means for me this week.

Ways this could work:

I could remember that this is what I want. I could remember my tendency to get disconnected when I’m experiencing too much.

And I can keep working on the sovereignty stuff.

My commitment.

I will notice what’s going on for me. I will remind myself to stay grounded. I will ask for help when I need it. Or try to. :)

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since … last time.

I asked for the perfect spot to lead a retreat. With a love letter. And got a bunch of good leads. Will have the short list very very soon. Tomorrow, I hope.

And no news on a power-hitting outfielder for the Giants. I think I should have mentioned that we don’t want Milton Bradley, if the Cubs are listening. Which they should be. Anyway, I think that ask was mostly just to make me feel better.

Also, remember two weeks ago when I asked for support cranking out blog posts? Nothing happened with that last week, but yesterday I wrote one in the airport and three on the plane. Unheard of.

Especially since I can pretty much never work on the plane. But it was so quiet that it totally worked. Yay.

Comments. Since I’m already asking …

I am adding to my practice of asking for stuff by being more specific about what I would like to receive in the comments. And that way, if you feel like leaving one (you totally don’t have to), you get to be part of this experiment too. :)

Here’s what I want (just leave them in the comments):

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!

What I would rather not have:

• Reality theories.
• Shoulds. As in, “You should be doing it like this” or “That’s not the right way to ask for things — instead it should be like x, y and z”
• To be judged or psychoanalyzed.

My commitment.

I am committing to getting better at asking for things even when asking feels weird. I commit to giving time and thought to the things that people say, and to interact with their ideas and with my own stuff as compassionately and honestly as is possible.

Thanks for doing this with me!

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Very Personal Ads #18: awkward love letter to a place that might or might not have a labyrinth
• Very Personal Ads #17: Taking the um out of momentum
• Very Personal Ads #16: that one place where the old lady plays the organ

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

Sixty-six Chickens, ladies and gentleman. I don’t know why that’s exciting but it is.

And I’m in North Carolina! Again! Remember when I had a whole Friday Chicken called the … North Carolina Edition?

That’s because I kind of didn’t expect to be back there any time in the near future.

And now I’m there again. Because Barbara Sher (swoon!) is teaching a retreat there, and I wouldn’t miss it for anything.

The hard stuff

I hab a code.

Spent all week with this stupid cold that didn’t want to go away.

It makes all the good things in my life (sleep! yoga! dancing!) way less fun.

Stupid red nose.

In transition. I mean, in transit. Well, both.

We (me, Selma, the gentleman friend) got back from Vancouver Saturday night. Thursday morning I was on a plane again.

So the whole week was just playing catch-up and then off and running again.

Very disconcerting. And hard to concentrate.

My clothes are all destroyed.

I need to hedge here and say something like “don’t think I’m crazy buuuuuuut”. And now I’m hedging my hedge.

Okay.

There’s this screwed-up pattern in my life that makes no sense. Whenever I go through transition-ey stuff in my life, my clothes fall apart. I know.

Maybe it makes too much sense. Anyway.

Buttons fall off. Holes develop in places that you’d never even have thought possible. Things tear, stain, shrink, come undone.

Even new and new-ish things start unraveling and ripping all over the place.

The timing on this is incredibly irritating. And that’s all I want to say about that.

Got overloaded in a bad way.

I participated in a teleseminar on Sunday that was seven hours long. Without breaks.

Not that it wasn’t fascinating and powerful, because it was.

It’s just that my brain and body can’t function under those circumstances. I got kind of … energetically swamped. And everything shut down.

And then I had to spend the rest of the day crying in bed and the next day or so recovering.

Not from the material. Just from the physical experience of being on a phone and interacting with other people for that long.

Just another reminder of how I really need to make taking care of myself top priority, and to remember the sovereignty thing.

I broke Stu.

Not for good or anything. But I stepped on his head and now he has a crack. It’s a long, horrible story that I don’t feel like getting into.

Travel stress.

Gah. Stuck on runways. Delays. Missed flights. Arriving in North Carolina midnight after everything I did to avoid that outcome.

Little frustrations and irritations.

I’d spent the whole week looking forward to this one dance class. And then, somehow, it slipped my mind and we ended up running really late and stressing.

And there seemed to be lots of little moments like this, where I would lose track of something, panic, and have to come down.

The good stuff

Stuff working despite the frustrations and irritations..

So, even though there was just no way we were going to make to dancing on time, we got there on time.

And found a parking place right in front. Which has never happened. Nothing even close. And I’ve been going there since June.

Or then the car battery died right when my gentleman friend was supposed to be taking me to the airport yesterday morning.

But then a cab arrived within two minutes (which is unheard of where we live) and the driver was listening to NPR and it was just perfect.

Stuff like that.

On retreat! Retreeeeeeeeeeeaaaat!

As we know from this past summer, I love retreating.

And I’ve wanted to study with Barbara ever since reading Wishcraft. This is the last time she’s teaching this particular program, so I’ve very excited.

Travel not sucking. Astoundingly.

I have a lot of Friday Chicken updates about sucky travel stuff, and more than one Very Personal Ad asking for harmony and ease and stuff like that while going from one place to another.

Well.

This week — amid the suck — I’ve managed to have some of the best, most comfortable travel ever.

On the way back from visiting Hiro, my gentleman friend and I were two of the five passengers on the flight. No line at customs. No line going through security. It was like magic.

And yesterday, on my way to North Carolina?

No line going through security. Nothing. No hassling. The terminal was quiet. The plane was full but there was one empty seat and it was … next to me.

We were told there wasn’t going to be any room in the overhead bins but right above my seat there was an empty bin.

No crying babies. No loud-talkers. I didn’t even put in earplugs. And I usually live in my earplugs while I’m traveling.

Basically the whole thing (well, until the part when everything went to hell) was such smooth sailing that I think I might have accidentally gone through an opening in the matrix and popped into one of my parallel lives where things actually work.

Oh, and I found a penny!

I worked through a stuck.

Remember on Tuesday when I had a mediated interaction with a stuck?

Well, the thing that I was busy not doing has been done and is all taken care of. Thank you, mediator mouse.

Working on my dammit list.

It makes me happy.

And that’s a good thing, dammit.

And … playing live at the meme beach house!

Yes, that’s a Stuism too.

My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”

This week it’s:

Sparkly Freckle

Jolie: “And then my niece pointed at my nose ring and said ‘Aunt Jolie, I love your sparkly freckle!’”
Me: “Isn’t that a band?”
Jolie: “Well, actually it’s just one guy.”

No Stuisms this week, sadly, because Stu is in recovery mode and also because he didn’t say anything that funny. I hope it’s not connected to having been stepped on.

Because if I thought stepping on him would make him work, I would have done that ages ago.

That’s it for me …

And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.

Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?

And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Very Personal Ads #18: awkward love letter to a place that might or might not have a labyrinth
• Very Personal Ads #6: In search of a title
• Friday Check-in #53: frizzy hair edition

And thinking about how much I love my dammit list, dammit.

And how each time I add something to it, my life gets better.

Well, my stuff comes up and then I work through it and then my life gets better.

Perfect example: the fact that I didn’t wake up at dark-thirty today.

A few months ago I decided it was hazardous to my sanity to keep taking flights that leave at 6 a.m.

Because even if I pack the night before and skip my morning yoga and meditation, it still means going to bed at a million o’clock, and getting up five minutes later.

Which sucks.

So I tried to institute a reassuring “I only fly at reasonable hours, dammit!” policy.

This would also be the “No red-eye flights anymore dammit!” policy and the “I’m not going to spend the entire day bleary-eyed and confused, dammit!” policy.

And then all my who do you think you are stuff kicked in.

The me-who-used-to-be-poor thought this was extravagant. And arrogant. Like, after all those years of having no choices and no options, how can you suddenly have these ridiculous standards?

Me, in my head: “How can you be so spoiled? You should just shut up and say thank you that you can travel places. And be done with it. It’s enough.”

So I had to work on it.

A lot.

It took a while. I mean, not that I’m done with it. But mostly done.

I asked myself a lot of questions. Like:

– Can we experiment with this?
– Can we see what happens to my emotional state when we travel under conditions that are supportive and not destructive?
– Is it possible that this will mean less recovery time after traveling, in which case it might end up being an investment in myself and my business?
– Am I going to live my whole life choosing discomforts so that me-who-suffered-and-survived will feel like she had a purpose?

I’ve had to take a lot of time to acknowledge everything that Survivalist Me, as Hiro calls her, has done for me so that she could agree to go take a nap once in a while.

Here’s what happened.

Much to my astonishment, having this new policy on my Dammit List has not been crazy expensive.

It turns out that if you book your flights far enough in advance, it’s not a big difference. And it takes much less time to find a flight when you’re operating under the “only at reasonable times” rule.

And it turns out that recovery time is substantially less intense that way, so I get back to work and productive-mode sooner.

And that my nervous system is less likely to get thrashed, so I do better when I arrive.

Oh, and the Portland airport is waaaaaaaaaaay less crowded at say, 8:30 a.m. than it is at 6 a.m. The last two times I’ve done this, there has been no line at all going through security.

Basically, everything is better. By a lot.

So now I’m adding things to my Dammit List. Like mad.

Sure, I know it will trigger some stuff.

I know I’ll have new things to work on and through.

But it’s worth it.

Next week I’ll let you know what’s going on the list.

In the meantime, I’m going to put as many things on my dammit list as I want, dammit!

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• My annual Berlin Freak Out post: this time with extra … something.
• Pirate beauty and other good things.
• A gigantic block. And some destuckifying.

Actually, I’m under the strict compulsion to write ten pages about anything on my mind. So this is me. Practicing brevity.

Seriously? Wednesday?

I don’t get it. Especially since that seems to indicate that tomorrow might be Thursday and I’m not sure how I feel about that. Moving on. Items!

Item! Post No. 39 in a series that is apparently self-perpetuating, because people refuse to stop being cool, weird or interesting — or doing cool, weird, interesting things.

Item! You need a calendar, right?

Since I already spend way too much time in the online store of Leah Piken Kolidas online store, falling in love with her paintings, the news that yes, she did a calendar this year made me really, really happy.

I’m not even such a calendar person, but yes, it would be kind of nice to know what month it is. Or what day it is, for that matter.

And if I can see one of Leah’s gorgeous pieces each month (other than her painting that’s hanging in my hallway), life is good. So I ordered one and can’t wait to get it.

Here’s the coolest part.

If you pre-order the calendar by November 30th, she’ll do a personal drawing on your birthday square in the calendar.

Nice!

She’s @leah_art on Twitter.

Item! Yup. The flexible umlaut!

This bit from the much adored Nancy Friedman made me laugh. And cringe.

I’m so her Right People. I’m also the person who recently couldn’t buy toothpaste because it had a ludicrous non-functioning aesthetically-horrifying umlaut in the name.

She’s @fritinancy on Twitter.

Item! This completely made my week.

Every once in a while I come across something by a complete stranger that’s about one of my products or something I’ve taught.

And it always makes me go whoooooaaaaaah, right. All these smart, interesting people are using this stuff and I don’t even know them.

“I know I’m not ‘fixed’, just like that. I know it’s something I’ll have to keep working on. But I know how to maintain this. I’m confident that things won’t be as bad as they were ever again.”

I thought this was a beautiful post about working with procrastination stucknesses. And I loved that she called the post Flow.

Item! The great Italian pizza fiasco.

This is from Cate’s Culturally Teaching blog.

It’s a great story. Man. Having lived in three countries, I probably have a thousand stories like that, all hastily repressed. And yeah, her point is a good one.

“But really, we only fail in such situations if we don’t learn something from them. And from this experience, I learned to be a cultural sponge, not a cultural hammer.”

Do you know Cate?

She’s @CateBrubaker on Twitter.

Item! You have to love a man who says Quindozillion.

Ah, the delightful William S. Randall. Who has been Itemized before.

Because it takes balls to have a tagline about turning your clients into zombies.

That is an enormous amount of human life flushed down the drain That is a huge opportunity. Because the eyeballs are there. Because people don’t have to be coaxed into watching video online like they did buying stuff online 10 years ago.

Keep reading.

I have no idea why he’s not on Twitter. Dude! Come hang out at the bar!

Item! A year of yarn. No, a year of yarn.

Come on, people who are busily making me fan-socks (the kind without toes and heels, please, so I can wear them while teaching yoga, thank you!).

You need more yarn, right? Gorgeous, gorgeous yarn.

And Tara the Blonde Chicken is still doing her yarn-subscription thing, but is only letting a few more people in before she goes crazy, as related in this funny, funny post called The Yarn Mail always Rings Twice.

“If your loved ones are asking you ‘What do you want for Christmas/Hanukkah/Solstice/your birthday?’, here’s your answer: A Year of Yarn! If they’re not asking you, what’s wrong with them?

This is a particularly good test of just how close a “loved one” is: could you ask them for a Year of Yarn?

Or would they find that completely ridiculously crazy?

If they don’t blink an eye and instead say something like “Hmm…that’s 12 months of yarn for the price of 10, what a deal!”, you know have a keeper. Like, forever. If not already blood related – marry this person! Put yarn in your vows! Knit yourself a dress like this!”

She’s @blondechicken on Twitter.

Item! Flow charts never get boring.

My latest two (non-xkcd) favorites are:

• The Hey Jude flowchart
• The What Religion Should You Follow flowchart (even if they did kind of get the hummus part wrong)

Okay. And the xkcd flowcharts:

• The tech-support cheat sheet

• The ’90s
• And, of course, the all-time best: the guide to understanding flow charts

Item! Update from the land of the Peculiar & Hilarious Shivanauts!

The “peculiar and hilarious” thing comes from Melynda’s sweet bit about Butterfly Wishes.

This sweet, insightful piece from Thorin Messer is awesome. And he wrote it for me! I don’t think anyone has ever written a blog post for me.

Except, you know, ranty people who don’t like me. Which totally doesn’t count.

“When did this happen? When I was a kid, I didn’t give a shit about being good at stuff. What I liked, as a kid, I liked doing stuff. Anything. Totally wacky, goofy, even dumb stuff. Making useless, inane noises. Throwing my body around like I was a rag doll. I didn’t have to execute a perfect tango. I could jump up and down!”

He’s @thorinmesser on Twitter.

Item! Comments!

So it was really cool the other week when I got to work on my practice of how I ask for stuff and you guys gave me the best recommendations ever!

Here’s what I want this time:

• Things you’re thinking about.
• That song that won’t get out of your head.

My commitment.
I am committed to giving time and thought to the things that people say, and I will interact with their ideas and with my own stuff as compassionately and honestly as is possible for me.

Even though asking for what I want still feels awkward for me, I’m just going to remind myself that this is a thing I’m practicing.

That is all.

Happy reading.

And happy Blustery Windsday. See you tomorrow.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Friday Check-in #55: Blonde Chicken Chicken Chicken.
• Item! My brain just rickrolled me.
• Item! Justify this!

So yes. I’m a big fan of talking to blocks and interacting with stucknesses but I also think it’s useful to have someone around to negotiate for you. Because talking to the stuck is hard.

And uncomfortable.

Like when I had Cobalt mediate my conversation with my arms when my arms were on strike.

Or when I got together with the negotiator, the monster and the scribe.

Long story short? I went to have a conversation with a stuck today. And my stuck refused to talk to me. So I brought in a mediator.

It only gets more weird from there, so I guess that’s all the introduction I can give.

For some reason I’m on a stage, sitting in a tall wooden chair. The mediator enters stage right.

The mediator: So … what’s going on here?
Me: I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.
The mediator (after a pause): Sounds like you’re feeling kind of frustrated… is that right?
Me: Uh huh.
The mediator: Okay.
Me: Sigh.
The mediator (looking around the empty stage): Where’s your stuck? I don’t see anything…
Me: I don’t know.
The mediator: Tell me a bit more about what’s going on.
Me: I don’t know!
The mediator: Alright. We can do this without the stuck too. Why don’t you just tell me what you do know.

Me: I feel so confused.
The mediator: Do you know what the stuck is about?
Me: That’s the problem. So I have this thing. And it’s a thing I want to do. And I’m not doing it. And I don’t know if the stuck is the thing or the not wanting to do it or the resistance or the resentment or all those things together and …
The mediator: I know you’ll probably smack me if I tell you to take a deep breath …
Me: Don’t say it.
The mediator: Okay.
Me: breathes

The mediator: You know, I don’t think it matters right now — for our purposes — what the source of the stuck is. This is more about your relationship with the stuck than the stuck itself.
Me: Alright.
The mediator: What do you need from the stuck?
Me: To show up so I know what it is. To stop hiding from me! To say something so I can refute it and tell it why it’s wrong.
The mediator: Ah. Okay. That might be why it’s not showing up.

Me: Oh. I see. My stuck is afraid that if it comes out of hiding I’ll try to convince it to stop being stuck?
The mediator: Or to stop being afraid … or to stop worrying about you.
Me: My stuck likes to worry about me.
The mediator: You got it.

Me (shouting offstage): Come out, stuck! I’m not going to try to talk you out of being stuck!
The mediator (raising eyebrow): Really?
Me: Whose side are you on, anyway?
The mediator: Um, I’m a mediator. That’s why you called me.
Me: Oooooof.
The mediator: You don’t have to make promises you can’t or won’t keep. You can just agree to meet with the stuck and find out what’s going on.
Me (sticking tongue out): Fine. I agree to meet with the stuck.
The mediator: Let’s do this thing.

The stuck comes shambling out and sits down in a metal folding chair that has appeared out of nowhere. There is a spotlight just in front of the chair, so the stuck seems to be even more in shadow than it already is.

The stuck is wrapped in layers of dark cloth, it could be sheets or a shroud. The shape of a person, with no body parts visible, not even a face.

The mediator: Alright. Progress. I appreciate that you’ve come out here to sit with us.
Me: Come on.
The mediator: What?
Me: Is this going to be one of those stupid Jungian things where we unveil the stuck and it turns out to be me underneath? Because that’s lame.
The mediator: No. No, it’s not you under there.
Me: It’s not?
The mediator: No.
Me: ?!?!

The mediator: There isn’t anything under there.
Me: ?!?!
The mediator: (shrugs)

Me: So … what are we doing here then?
The mediator: This isn’t really stuck. It’s just the shell of a stuck. It’s the reminder of a stuck. It’s old, old, old, residual frameworks that used to surround a stuck. But there’s nothing inside.
Me: How do you even know this stuff?
The mediator: A mediator knows many things.
Me: About Floyd Merkle’s death?
The mediator: Why would a mediator know that?
Me: (giggles)
The mediator: Sooooo … as much fun as it is quoting obscure Neil Simon movies, maybe we should get back to the stuck.
Me: You said it’s not a stuck.
The mediator: The shadow of the stuck.
Me: I told you. None of this Jungian stuff. I’m not in the mood for it.

Me: This is what I want to know. What does this stuck need from me in order to be able to heal or be transformed or whatever hippie-ass stuff happens to stuck?
The mediator: Exactly.
Me: What?
The mediator: What does this stuck — this shadow of stuck — need from you?
Me: To acknowledge that it isn’t real? But that it’s still here? And that I need it to remember that it’s just a shadow of what was?
The mediator: Bingo. I don’t know why you even need me around.
Me: Who else do I get to quote obscure Neil Simon movies with?
The mediator: I could answer that, but you won’t like the answer.

Me: So what happens now?
The mediator: Your stuck is from then. It doesn’t know that it’s now. That now you have other things to deal with. It’s not that you won’t have stuck anymore. It’s just that this particular version of stuck isn’t a part of your life anymore.
Me: But it doesn’t seem to know that.
The mediator: Yeah, it needs to come into present time. Into right now.
Me: What does that even mean? And why are you speaking in this spooky voice?
The mediator: I was kind of hoping that something would happen …

A trapeze bar descends from the ceiling. A young woman dressed in a hot pink ’80s prom dress holding a glitter-decorated scepter is sitting on it, swinging her legs. There might also be confetti.

Me: Give me a break. A freaking deus ex machina?
The mediator: It’s hard to find a way to actually show the quality of present time. We’re doing what we can here.
Me: shakes head
The mediator: Can we bring this stuck into right now? Into your current state where this stuck doesn’t live anymore?
Me: If the stuck is willing, I guess I am.
The mediator: Whose side are you on, anyway?

Me: Well, it is MY stuck.
The mediator: Your stuck that you’re not going to identify with anymore.
Me: No, I do identify with it.
The mediator: Okay. What do you need, then?
Me: For you to know that it’s hard for me to process all this stuff. It’s hard for me to recognize where I am, and what’s still my stuck and what’s my old stuck.
The mediator: Oh, sweetie. You’re feeling frustrated because you need us to acknowledge how painful this is for you.
Me: We?

The stuck is next to me now, patting my hand.

Me: Oh, stuck. The mediator is right. I’m having as much trouble letting you go as I was dealing with you when you were really there.
The mediator: Oh, it’s okay. There will be new stuck.
Me: Thanks. That’s really helpful. What’s wrong with you?
The mediator (laughs): I think we’re done for now. Is it okay if I take the stuck shadow with me?
Me: See you next time. I think I’m going to practice my lindy hop with the princess here.

Me and Present Time dance around the stage.

Curtain.

Comment zen for today:

I don’t even know what to put here.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• A gigantic block. And some destuckifying.
• Conversations with blocks: Part 3
• A tiny but important business lesson

Here it is:

“How did you get into the coaching thing? How did you get started? Is there a post about this already? If so, can you point me to it?”

Crap. I was positive there was a post about this.

There wasn’t, so I must have either written it in my head (in which case, where did it go???) or answered it in an email a million years ago when I still did email.

Anyway. Here’s the abridged version.

And I should warn you that the problem with my particular story is that it’s weird enough to be un-repeatable. But I’ll try to throw in some Useful Bits at the end.

People started showing up.

It’s 2003-ish.

I’m living in Tel Aviv.

I haven’t heard the word “coaching” yet. And if I had it probably would have made me throw up.*

In the meantime, I’ve been processing my transition from professional bitchy rockstar barmaid to kooky yoga teacher.

And that’s when they started showing up.

People. Wanting me to help them shift stuff.

First it was other yoga teachers. Wanting to know what techniques I was using to pull off the tough life changes they’d seen me make. Then it was my students. Then it was random strangers.

*It still kind of does. I really, really dislike the word “coaching”.

So I started teaching.

The issues people had were all different.

Everything from broken hearts to losing weight to wanting to learn Russian (I don’t speak Russian, which made it even more interesting).

And the stuff I taught was always about figuring out what your stuff was, and then interacting with said stuff in a conscious way.

I’d started experiencing for myself how Dance of Shiva was rewriting my patterns in the craziest of ways, so I prescribed it in small doses. And of course yoga. And cognitive exercises. And and and.

In my mind it was all yoga, just … not the stuff they teach you in the kind of classes where the focus is, you know, how to stick your leg behind your head.

Then people wanted to pay me. Which totally freaked me out.

Like a lot of yoga teachers and alternative health practitioners of all stripes, I was dealing with more than enough stucknesses of my own around “receiving” in any form.

But especially the “monetary renumeration” kind.

It was becoming clear that people wanted to give me money for my help, so I used my techniques to work on that too — slowly, slowly, slowly.

In the fight between “I can’t take money for sharing universal wisdom — something that I’m just distilling and helping someone apply to their specific situation” and “but I also can’t make enough money teaching regular yoga”, the need to pay rent won.

Well, the need to pay rent combined with my inability to stay in a job anywhere that’s not a bar or a yoga studio.

So my help became a thing.

And now the Twilight Zone part.

I moved to Berlin. And within the first week everything went to pieces.

The ear infection from hell changed everything.

I lost all hearing in my right ear for six months. I was weak. I couldn’t work. I couldn’t teach. I couldn’t do yoga.

None of my trusty techniques were relevant in this situation.

In total desperation, I turned to flavors of weird energy stuff that I had always thought were ridiculous — and ended up adding all sorts of wackiness to my repertoire of things that can potentially be useful.

In the meantime, something about the stuff happening in my middle ear allowed me to access all kinds of intuitive abilities. Scared me half to death.

So I was healing from huge amounts of pain. And I was learning how to use my powers.

Oh. And I’d decided to use them for good. Which was also scary.

I got better. And three things happened.

1. I threw myself back into my Shiva Nata practice. Epiphany city. Huge, huge, huge understandings about everything in my life.

2. I downloaded the entire Fluent Self system in one afternoon. It just came — and I spent the next few months furiously writing down everything I could.

3. And I started teaching workshops about changing habits and rewriting patterns. See also: How The Fluent Self Got Its Spots.

Then more things happened.

People started hiring me to help them problem-solve.

The Dance of Shiva parts of the workshops were very successful. So successful that I started focusing on the brain-training part of my system, because that was what people seemed to want.

After an eleven year hiatus, I returned to the States.

I discovered that this helper-mouse thing I was doing was already sort of a thing.

People didn’t do it the way I did it. But in a sense it was a thing, and that thing was called “coaching”.

To certify or not to certify.

Aside from my issues with the word (it still conjures up an image of a gym teacher with a whistle hanging from his neck, yelling GO GO GO GO GO), I also had issues with certification.

One of the things I’d learned from the yoga world was that certification is one of the most bullshit things there is. At best irrelevant, and at worst scammy.

I don’t regret any of the yoga teacher trainings I have done. That’s how I first connected with Andrey Lappa, who became my intellectual and spiritual mentors.

These kinds of trainings have allowed me to study with phenomenal teachers, to go deep into all kinds of learning, and to become a better teacher through watching other people do it.

But you know what?

I was a perfectly good yoga teacher before those trainings.

And in all my years of teaching yoga and Shiva Nata in yoga studios around the world, not once have I been asked if I have international certification. I do, but no one has ever asked.

So I decided that I would keep learning stuff from the coaching world. And I would take trainings if and when I felt moved to. But I wasn’t going to jump through a bunch of hoops for a totally meaningless piece of paper.

Whew.

And then?

Well, no one (aside from people who want to become coaches) has ever asked me if I have “coaching certification”.

People hired me and my duck. They had ridiuculously great results. They told other people.

Selma and I turned some of our workshops into online programs and ebooks and stuff.

We went through some really rough parts too. Got all kinds of terrible advice.** Made mistakes. Learned stuff. And it didn’t happen overnight either.

**Thanks for nothing, everyone who thought I needed to specialize in something targeted like ‘helping 45 year old women quit smoking’.

I used my techniques to biggify my own business and — more importantly — to gradually feel more comfortable being all biggified.

Which got me all fired up about the connection between working on your stuff and bringing your thing into the world.

The intersection of non-cheesy self-help and mindful business biggification.

And here we are. Hi.

The take-aways, such as they are.

So I wouldn’t recommend that you try to follow my path or imitate what I’ve done because yeah, even if you could, it would still be painful and horrible.

Not recommended.

What I would say is this:

• I definitely wish I’d spent less time waiting for external forces to give me the legitimacy to help the people who wanted my help.
• The smartest thing I did along the way was making my first priority working on my own stuff. Everything comes from that anyway.
• If I were doing it again, I’d spend less time hiding my duck from the world while trying to sound like an expert (yuck), and more time being my kooky self out loud.
• Continued learning and education = the bomb. Certification = hugely unnecessary.

Hope some of that is helpful. And, if not, then at least semi-entertaining.

Good luck with your thing. Your thing! And even if this seems impossible to believe right now, the world needs you. And hiding from the people who need you isn’t fair to them or to you.

Okay. Off the soapbox. I promise not to be all inspirational for at least a few weeks. :)

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Very Personal Ads #13: What’s a sexier word for “productivity”?
• Tiny little answers.
• I wanted to ask you something.

So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.

And now it’s my weekly ritual. Yay, ritual!

Let’s do this thing.

Thing 1: Perfect-for-me spot to lead a retreat.

Dear perfect-for-me spot to lead a retreat,

Selma and I will be teaching several retreats this year, and we are still looking for the perfect place for one of them. Maybe two of them.

We love you and we want to find you. Yes, it’s a little forward of me to declare undying love before we’ve even met, but I know you are waiting for me too.

You:

You are fun. You are calm. You are restful. You are beautiful. You have that certain magically charged something. We go zing together.

You are (ideally) on the west coast. I’d be happiest if you were somewhere between San Francisco and the Oregon coast.

But yeah, I’d be willing to go as far south as San Luis Obispo or as far north as Vancouver.

The important parts:

You have room for twenty people to stay comfortably. Mostly single rooms, with some doubles in case people want to share. But no more than two beds to a room.

Each bedroom needs to have its own bathroom.

You are not “rustic”. (No bunk beds, no log cabins, no antlers and/or potpourri hanging from walls).

Being with you is all about comfort. This is not a low-end production. We want to feel safe, supported and loved while we’re doing our wacky working-on-our-stuff stuff.

But on the other hand, you’re also not excessively super-fancy resort-ey (we’re not so into enormous flat-screen televisions or in-room massage or whatever).

The other bits:

I would love it if you had a labyrinth. Then I can do my wacky labyrinth exercise before we actually walk the labyrinth.

And, because of where you’re located, I already know that the food you provide is local, sustainable, simple and delicious, made with love, with plenty of options for vegetarians and omnivores alike.

We’re going to be doing yoga and Dance of Shiva, in addition to mad biggification and destuckifying. So we’ll need a comfortable place to do movement stuff.

A whiteboard! Is a good thing.

You like rubber ducks, right? Or at least the one who is my assistant. Because she’ll be co-teaching. :)

You have a functioning, usable website that I can send people to.

Oh, and it’s really important to me that someone who works for you actually responds when my (non-duck) assistant writes you emails asking questions. We’ve already had to disqualify a dozen places because they just don’t write or call back.

So yeah, I’m feeling a bit frustrated, which is why I’m so ready to meet you and click with you. Yup. Whiirrrrrrrr click.

My commitment.

I will love you madly.

I will treat you right.

We will leave you the way we found you.

We will clear the energy and fill it with sparkly wonder.

I will talk you up on my blog and with my duck-loving pirate cult. Having me be a part of your thing will biggify you.

And I promise to fill this retreat on my own with my own people. Not a problem.

That’s why I’m not interested in applying to be part of an events calendar.

Mmmm. And I don’t want to have to send a proposal. This is my proposal. It’s a love letter.

That’s it. I love you. I want to meet you. I want to nuzzle your ear. Metaphorically.

Love,
Havi (and Selma)

p.s. If you had a hot tub? Or are near some mineral springs or something? I would not complain.

Thing 2: A power-hitting outfielder for the Giants.

Here’s what I want:

My gentleman friend is a fairly fanatical San Francisco Giants fan, and I’ve kind of caught that tragic, tragic disease by osmosis.

Though, weirdly, I was somehow immune from it while I was still living in San Francisco.

Anyway, the pain of having dazzlingly strong pitching and … uh, not much else is just. too. much.

Ways this could work:

Honestly? I have no idea. Of all the ridiculous asks, this is up there.

Maybe the Giants front office could pull their heads out of the normal place their heads reside and start reading the McCovey Chronicles. Or Moneyball. Come on!

And since that’s not going to happen, maybe a miracle.

Maybe Matt Holliday will suddenly fall into our laps. I don’t know.

Or maybe I’ll just stop caring so much and the pain will go away. That could work too.

My commitment.

I will cheer.

I will try to stop rolling my eyes every time I hear any Giants-related news.

I will occasionally say something nice about Barry Zito.

I will allow my gentleman friend to totally co-opt my Very Personal Ads with his addictively obsessive passion.

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since … last time.

I asked for clarity with my Kitchen Table program changes for this coming year.

And got it in spades, thanks to help from Hiro and Charlie and lots of invisible support. Yay.

My other ask was about cranking out blog posts to use during all the mad traveling I’m doing.

No progress on that one yet. I haven’t really had time to think about it since I was, uhhhh, traveling.

But I’ll sit with it some more. I may have to end up rewording the ask (or just rethinking how I want to ask for it).

What about you guys?

Comments. Since I’m already asking …

I am adding to my practice of asking for stuff by being more specific about what I would like to receive in the comments. And that way, if you feel like leaving one (you totally don’t have to), you get to be part of this experiment too. :)

Here’s what I want (just leave them in the comments):

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!

What I would rather not have:

• Reality theories.
• Shoulds. As in, “You should be doing it like this” or “That’s not the right way to ask for things — instead it should be like x, y and z”
• To be judged or psychoanalyzed.

My commitment.

I am committing to getting better at asking for things even when asking feels weird. I commit to giving time and thought to the things that people say, and to interact with their ideas and with my own stuff as compassionately and honestly as is possible.

Thanks for doing this with me!

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Very Personal Ads #19: Love letter
• Friday Chicken #66: the transition edition
• Ask Havi #28: How did you get into the coaching thing?

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

I’m in Canadia! Visiting Hiro! Excitement!

The hard stuff

Vancouver without Vancouver-ing.

Hiro lives in a small town on Vancouver Island so we (Selma, my gentleman friend and me) flew into Vancouver and then jumped on a ferry.

I love Vancouver. And it’s really weird to be almost there but not.

To not be hanging out with my dear friend Jane.

To not be visiting the cafe where Mario sings the milk song.

Also, I cannot believe it’s been fourteen months since my last Vancouver trip. Need to plan another one.

Stress + decision-making = ugh.

Stressful decisions.

Processing stuff.

Had to make some very uncomfortable choices, made all the more uncomfortable because my stuck has a huge effect on the people who work with me.

Still not happy about the way someone else’s decision resulted in the non-paying-off of a huge financial (non-biz-related) risk that I took.

And now my situation is having a negative impact on other people. UGH UGH UGH.

Travel.

Still don’t like it.

And yet I do it all the freaking time. Something to work on.

Nightmare.

Not sure what it was but I woke up screaming. Not fun.

The good stuff

Visiting Hiro!

I think of Hiro as my wise, goofy older sister.

And since we talk on the phone at least twice a week, I always forget that we’ve never actually met in real life.

So now Selma and I are hanging out with our playmate in real time, drinking tea and giggling. And it’s wonderful.

So so great!

Holiday!

Hiro lives in the most beautiful place ever.

I could really just stare out her window for days on end.

That view, plus that fact that she drags us off to hot tubs and stuffs us with delicious food is turning this into an even more delightful mini-vacation than it already was.

Contented sigh.

Making progress on my New Big Thing.

Between Hiro-magic and Charlie-magic, stuff is moving on this.

Very happy about it.

A smooth Friday.

This kind of belongs in last week’s Chicken, except that it started happening right after the Chicken got posted.

Fridays are always crazy-busy for me. Blog posts! Cleaning! Baking challah! Clients!

Usually by the time my assistant shows up or my first appointment is supposed to happen, I’m still trying to get through breakfast.

And then, oh no I forgot the bread dough! And so on.

But last Friday was the first ever Smooth Friday.

I was able to manage an hour of morning yoga, a walk with my gentleman friend, bread-dough-making and breakfast all before 9:30 a.m.

It was miraculous.

Roller derby!

The new season doesn’t start until January, but luckily there are all sorts of meets and match-ups still happening — and of course the national finals are coming.

My gentleman friend and I went to a couple exhibition bouts this week and are overjoyed to be back in the ass-kicking world of derby.

And then we went and had a beer with Sparky FIrepants. Mr. Pants!

And … playing live at the meme beach house!

Yes, that’s a Stuism too.

My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”

So this week, I bring you:

The Koan Brothers.

It’s … just one guy. Possibly Buddhist.

No Stuisims this week (alas) because Stu is on holiday too. He’ll be back — both here and to his annoying self — next week, I promise.

That’s it for me …

And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.

Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?

And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Ask Havi #27: Off-topic and totally random.
• Very Personal Ads #17: Taking the um out of momentum
• Friday Chicken #64: pretty pretty princess edition

It’s probably not even slightly surprising, but I get all sorts of questions that don’t really have anything to do with what I teach.

Some are too nuanced or complicated to answer in a hundred and forty characters at the bar (on Twitter) — and others don’t manage to fall even into the wildly broad categories of stuff I to write about here.

I always figured the right time would show up to answer some of the ones that show up over and over . And that time is (apparently) now, as I am off visiting Hiro and we are being a little bit silly.

So. Here they are. The answers to five off-topic questions — which you may or may not have been dying to know.

“Why is your gentleman friend your ‘gentleman friend’?”

Oh.

There is a story there.

When we first met, my gentleman friend called his parents and told them he’d fallen madly in love.

The next time they spoke, his mother asked after the ‘lady friend’.

My gentleman friend: You mean my girlfriend?
My gentleman friend’s mother: You’re a little too old for a girlfriend.

Awesome.

So I became the lady friend. And my gentleman friend is my gentleman friend.

“Why don’t you admit that your gentleman friend is actually a girl?”

Huh.

You know what’s funny? I talk about all sorts of things here that people would normally never bring up.

I’ve written about poverty and terror and stuff blowing up. And about my friend who is dead and my conversations with walls and the fact that my filling system is arranged by chakras.

Also, I live in northeast Portland, which is a place where my having a lady friend would not even be interesting.

Believe me, if my gentleman friend were my lady friend, y’all would know about it.

“How do you bake bread without using sugar?”

Juice.

I feed my little bread yeasties with juice instead of sugar.

Any non-citrus juice that’s 100% fruit will work, but I like grape juice best for bread. It does turn the dough a little bit purple-ey, but you get used to it.

Kedem is the brand I bake with, but my friends make my recipe work with whatever they have around the house, and it’s good that way too.

Mmm, bread!

“Why do you think yoga mats are evil?”

Um.

I’m not sure that I do think that yoga mats are evil.

But I must have said something to that effect because you’re asking the question. And yeah, it does kind of sound like something I might say. :)

So. Let’s see.

I think that yoga mats made with PVC are evil. First of all, you’re breathing in poison. And the manufacturing process (plus their inevitable destination as landfill), means that buying one is participating in crappifying the world. Neither of those are very yoga things to do.

If you’re going to get a mat, get one that’s biodegradable — or at least one that you’ll be able to leave it to your grandkids in good condition, like Peter’s manduka mat.

My deeper point is that mats are not so much evil as not really necessary.

A mind and a few working body parts, and you can do yoga. It doesn’t actually require much more than being able to breathe. Which is one of the things I love about it.

The danger comes when we start thinking that we need stuff to do yoga, and we get caught up in the trappings — in the “yoga industrial complex”.

The truth is that a blanket works great for most poses, and the floor works well for the rest. And we sometimes forget that having a narrow rectangle defining our space can really confine our creativity of movement.

But I also don’t think it’s bad to have a mat — not at all.

I have one myself (the compostable kind) and I use it when I want to work on balance stuff, or to mark out the space of “I am practicing yoga”.

For me, seeing the mat on the floor is a reminder that this is my daily ritual. That this is something I need and something I’m committed to.

“I don’t get it. You’re a big tree-hugging yoga hippie Shivanaut but you also like Roller Derby. Explain.”

“Explain”?

Roller Derby is all about drag, brilliantly bad puns, ass-kicking, stripey socks, marginalized culture, and beer.

Which is pretty much a list of all the stuff I like.

And I also like hugging trees.

We’re complex and multi-faceted beings.

I don’t know if I have a better explanation than that.

And that’s as good a place to finish today as any.

Honestly? I can’t come up with a conclusion for this one.

But since we’re off-topic anyway, feel free to jump in with stories of odd/interesting things that people ask you. Or that you wish they’d ask you. Or … anything else, really.

Comment zen:
We’ve all got our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff.

If this kinda seemed like your thing, you might like these too:

• Friday Chicken #65: worst band name ever
• Friday Chicken #64: pretty pretty princess edition
• Item! Corsets and clairvoyance. On the train!